[18 October 1919]

In response to the telegram from Isaakov from Petrograd that you transmitted yesterday, I report the following:

According to Komprod* information, yesterday 17/X in the morning, 31 cars of grain arrived in Petrograd; from the Moscow hub on the night of today 18/X, 18 cars of grain were supposed to be dispatched; furthermore, from Nizhni 16 October, 11 cars with grain were dispatched, and yesterday 17/X from there as well, 44 cars with grain were dispatched; thus, in the course of recent days, 104 cars of grain were dispatched to Petrograd; beginning from the 16th of October over the course of 3-4 days all dispatched grain should already be in Petrograd. Then, on 16th October from Nizhni to Peter, 10 cars with wheat were dispatched for Sevprodput'; from cars stranded on the Ryazan-Urals railway routes — one train with provisions consisting of 30 cars, and today 30+33+22=85 cars are being dispatched from Moscow to Petrograd 33 cars and to Oranienbaum 22 cars with various provisions.

As concerns vegetable oil, fish, and meat, the matter with dispatching these products stands as follows: vegetable oil is being dispatched today from Moscow district in the quantity of 1500 pud. for Peter troops; oil 2000 pud. to canteens (public dining halls in Petrograd are provided with oil from their own factory); fish is being dispatched today from Moscow warehouses — 20,000 [pud.] fish in the quantity of 7000 p. for military units and 3000 p. to canteens and in the quantity of 10,000 p. from Nizhni for the population; today an order is also being issued for the dispatch from Moscow of one car with meat conserves to Vologda, and an instruction is being given for the urgent loading in Petrograd from Vologda of 5000 p. of meat in live cattle; finally, Komprod confirms the proposal to the Vyatka gubprodkom for the urgent loading of meat in Bologoe and Petrograd of 8000 p.; one cannot, of course, count on the receipt of meat from Vyatka province in the nearest days. Member of the Board A. Sviderskii.

Badaev has 1000 pud. of vegetable oil
fish [today]
18/X + 300 p. of animal oil
tomorrow 19/X or 20/X 2 cars of meat conserves
Korostelev Station free

¹ Having received a request from Petrograd to strengthen food assistance, Lenin sent an inquiry to the People's Commissariat of Food concerning the quantity of provisions sent to Petrograd. On the basis of Sviderskii's report, Lenin sketched out a numerical summary of the data on the quantity of food shipments directed to Petrograd in the margins on the left.

* These data were used by Lenin in his telegram to Zinoviev of 18 October 1919 (see p. 137). Ed.